I think it's a combo of the first two, along with popularity and a desire to not have one or two players completely dominate the MVP race for any given era.
2 and 3 for sure. 1 shouldn't be the case since, you know, it's a team sport and many factors pull into a team's record.
It's in the name. Most Valuable player. What player has the most value to his team. What player is the best player in the NBA. This BS of best player on the best team is garbage. That's not a jab just at Curry, that's a jab at Harden too. Harden shouldn't have been number 2 last year, WB should have been 1,2 and 3. He was, and in a lot of ways is the most valuable player... Hell, LeBron isn't bad himself. You take LeBron off of Cleveland and you have the least valuable team in the NBA. LeBron makes that team.
Agree with parts of this. "Value" should be determined on a player's impact for the team. I can't justify Curry as MVP unless they change the name of the award. It just doesn't make sense
How do you gauge a player's value to his team? Curry has the best win share, wouldn't that make him most valuable to the team? And I thought MVP should be the league's most valuable player and not a team's. So team record should be considered. A 30-win crappy team may be winless without its best player, but it doesn't automatically make that player the league's MVP.
Westbrook as the the MVP last season is a joke. Like you said, it's in the name. Most valuable player. If you take Westbrook off the Thunder last year, they miss the playoffs, but thanks to his superhuman efforts, they... missed the playoffs anyway. Definitely not the most valuable.
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I voted for (1) but I think (1) and (3) are actually the same thing. People seem to think a good player on a mediocre team is "more valuable" than a good player on a great team because...the mediocre team would be worse if they didn't have the player? Well, duh...the great team would be worse too without their good player. The Rockets would be terrible without Harden, but the Warriors would slip from 73 wins to 50-55 without Curry, which is a huge tumble also. (3) seems to be pitched to this wrong-headed idea that going from 73 wins to 53 wins doesn't really matter but going from 41 wins to, say, 30 wins is crushing.
I think the qualification changes with each season for me because it's kind of based off feel. This year Steph was the best player on the best team, but he was also the best player in the league and he was THE guy this year. He owned the NBA this season. Last year, Harden carrying this squad to the 2nd seed through inept coaching and a horrible injury toll earned him that MVP and it should have been his. Carry was not the offensive force he was this season and the dubs were more balanced. Having Harden be MVP last year, and the Steph lift his game and get it this year would have made more sense. I think most fans just have a sense of who the guy is.
Combo of all 3. It's not just the best player, because he might have been injured or had a lot of help on his team. It doesn't have to be the best team, but it has to be a very good team. He doesn't have to be the most irreplaceable, but the team should play worse without him
Option 4: player who elevates his team's chances of winning a championship the most compared to his team's chances after replacing him with a league average player. Players on non-contenders are therefore automatically out of the running. Also, it means more to elevate a 50 win team to 70 than to lift a 30 win team to 50. The better a team is, the harder it is to make that team still better. I respect players who will their team from lottery to mediocrity, but that's not what the MVP is about.
I disagree with this. In the past, yeah, CLE is nothing without Bron, but I think a Bron-less CLE team can make the playoffs in the East, still.
Best individual player in the league. If someone on Philly is scoring 40ppg and averaging a triple double and they are last in the league, he should still win MVP.
